Leaders help themselves and their team members accomplish a task by setting the right direction, vision and mission. It requires effective leadership skills to be able to lead a team towards the achievement of common goals. There is no one right way to lead in all the circumstances. Every leader does it in his or her unique style. Leadership, therefore, is a combination of several key skills that include communication, delegation, motivation, innovation and problem solving to name a few. A leader needs to be flexible and should be able to adapt to changing circumstances.
Leadership skills, in general, help in dealing with others respectfully and effectively to complete a task and hence are sought after by employers. Therefore, leadership skills assessment is becoming a part of recruitment, especially for lateral hiring.
Essential Leadership Skills
There is no single leadership style, rather leadership is a mix and match of certain core skills that help leaders effectively lead a team. Leadership assessments are designed to test these skills in the candidates to gauge their suitability for a particular role within the organisation. Let us look at some of the important skills that leadership assessment tools seek to evaluate:
- Communication: An important interpersonal skill that successful leaders have to be really good at. They need to be able to clearly and accurately communicate the vision and goal to the team members and listen to their ideas to work out a strategic plan to achieve the same.
- Delegation: An effective and strong leader is able to assign tasks and duties to the team members as per their skill set with a clear definition of expectation and turnaround time. They should also be able to evaluate the performance and give appropriate feedback to achieve the desired output. Delegation helps the leader focus on important tasks.
- Motivation: A leader should be able to inspire and motivate the team members to go that extra mile in order to deliver the results. He/she knows the different motivators that work for each team member in order to encourage them towards productivity and passion.
- Emotional Intelligence: It is the ability to clearly understand the emotions of self and others and express them in a healthy way.
- Innovation: Approaching any task and/or issue with an open mind allows for innovative and non-traditional solutions to flow in. It requires out-of-the-box thinking skills and is a desirable skill in a leader.
- Problem Solving: It is the process of defining a problem, analysing the cause, and finding various alternative solutions.
- Responsibility: Be it success or failure, a leader is responsible for both and should be capable of taking them both in the stride. Accepting mistakes and acknowledging failures is quite important so that the reasons for the setback can be analysed and the path towards success can be paved. It helps to come up with solutions for improvement.
An effective leadership assessment test should be able to present the candidates with relevant questions and scenarios that bring out their natural responses which allow testing their leadership skills and abilities.
Applications of Leadership Tests
Many of the skills required in a leader are soft skills. Candidates being hired for middle and top management positions should possess and use these skills effectively to lead the company towards success. A leadership skills test is more relevant for lateral hire recruitment. It can also come in handy during promotions and appraisals to identify potential leaders amongst the employees of the organisation.
A leadership test can also serve as a precursor to a leadership development program in order to develop a tailor-made training program for deserving employees.
MeritTrac Platforms for Leadership Assessments
MeritTrac is here to offer complete end-to-end assessment solutions both for recruitment as well as workforce development processes. Our platforms can be used to design tests as per the talent requirement and administer leadership assessment test as per your requirement. Our adaptive platforms allow easy setup and smooth delivery of the assessments. The following MeritTrac platforms will make recruitment and training a breeze:
Pariksha
It is a hybrid scientific assessment platform from MeritTrac that makes the entire process easy, quick and secure. Right from creating, designing, scheduling and delivering the leadership assessments to analysing and reporting the results, MeritTrac’s Pariksha makes the affair absolutely painless for the test administrators. Check out some of the key features of this platform:
- Remote delivery and invigilation with or without Internet
- Easy integration with external tools such as test marking software
- Highly adaptive testing features and customisable test catalogues
- Cloud ready
- Multi-platform
- Mobile ready
- Plug and play feature
SmartTest
It allows to screen and shortlist candidates fast and effectively. The salient features of SmartTest are:
- Anytime - Anywhere assessments
- Plug and play feature
- Wide range of test catalogue
- Superior candidate assessment analytics for performance benchmarking
- Assessment administration is smooth, quick and secure
FAQ
FAQ
1. What are leadership assessment tests?
A. These tests assess the leadership skills, abilities and capabilities of the candidates. They can be used for lateral hiring, workforce development and succession planning.
2. How do these tests prove useful?
A. A scientifically designed leadership assessment can help choose the ideal candidate who can not only fill the leadership role but also lead and deliver effectively. The tests can be customised as per the job profile to ensure that the selected candidate is a perfect fit for the leadership position.
3. What are the skills that can be assessed using these tests?
A. Leadership assessment tools help assess some of the important skills required for an effective leader that include communication, delegation, motivation, innovation and problem solving to name a few.
4. What are the USPs of MeritTrac leadership skills assessments?
The scientific nature of MeritTrac assessments help in making a quick, informed and unbiased selection of the right candidate. The test content is created by subject matter experts and can be customised as per your recruitment requirements.
5. What is the scope of MeritTrac leadership assessment tools?
MeritTrac tools can be used to make the right choice of candidates who can lead effectively, deliver the mission of the organisation and bring about a positive change in the work culture. They can also help identify potential leaders from amongst the existing employees.